Performing interviews and research in the actual world can be difficult. There is a plethora of paperwork which needs to be filled out, subjects must be obtained, and the process of conducting one interview could potentially take hours to arrange and execute. That being said, I was somewhat pleased that the research I had to do for the class was through Secondlife. Although I’m not very comfortable using the Secondlife program I figured it would be far easier in comparison to performing researching in the actual world. I was wrong. Perhaps it’s because I am not yet familiar with the proper protocol of the virtual world or Secondlife, or maybe it’s that I can’t be comfortable with the uncertainty of who I’m speaking with. Whatever the case, finding people to interview and trying to carry out a proper interview became “virtually” impossible for me during my first attempt.
The hardest part of trying to interview another avatar was approaching them. I found myself bringing ascribing norms of the actual world to that of Secondlife. For example, I wasn’t sure how to initially start a conversation with another avatar that would eventually lead in a scholarly direction. My avatar would approach other avatars but then I would feel self-conscious as if I was staring at them and them-me. As far as I am aware avatars don’t blink and therefore also likely lack the ability to stare another avatar down but I couldn’t help but feel as though it was unavoidable. Although the initial interview didn’t go as well as I would have liked I’m not too concerned about the future research, with more practice interviewing in Secondlife I’m sure it will become easier.